How to help your child with math: tips from educators

Teach a child mathematics should, first of all, the teacher. However, often children simply can not cope with the amount of information that is presented in one or two lessons at school. Children begin to get confused when new material begins to overlap on top of the unlearned material. And this is precisely the moment when a parent should come to the rescue. According to experts, if a parent manages to teach a child to solve math problems on their own while still in elementary school, it will be much easier for the child to learn.

It is important to teach your child not to get upset over mistakes

The first thing that prevents children from mastering a particular material is a special attitude towards mistakes. And mistakes are more common in math than in any other school subject. How can you convince your child that mistakes are no big deal?

As dozens of modern studies show, mistakes help the brain to develop, grow and look for ways out. And learning from your own mistakes is an extremely beneficial environment for a full learning process. Parents should be their child's cheerleaders, not his or her executioners when he or she makes some mistakes. The task of the parent is not only to explain information that the child does not understand. It is important to strengthen in him the belief that he can effectively solve any problem by his own actions, if he tries.

There is no such thing as a non-proficient in mathematics

And this is what most experienced educators say. All people initially have the same aptitude for learning. However, what separates the more successful people from the rest is the fact that they don't pass up in the face of adversity. They go ahead and look for ways to solve any problem.

If a parent tells his child that he never had an aptitude for mathematics, mentally he sends him the message that in such a situation, nothing can be done. You have to back off and drop everything. If even the parent can't do anything, that surely the child can't either.

So if mom or dad doesn't understand anything about a math homework assignment that the child has brought in asking for help, you shouldn't dismiss it by citing the difficulty. It's worth expressing the pleasant excitement that the parent will now learn something new together with the child, figure out math on their own, and help their child do it. Working as a team, focusing on problem solving together is a great way to train your child to overcome any difficulties.

You shouldn't solve problems for children, you should do it together with them

Many parents who do not have time for children's lessons, or want to make a perfect student of their child, solve problems for the child. This both cuts down on time, and gets rid of annoyance at the child. Do not do that!

Faced with difficulties, children naturally go to their parents for help. And when, instead of getting a solution to a particular problem, they get the solution to all the homework without any difficulty or understanding, it seems to them that this will always be the case in life.

That's why a parent should switch to this problem and help the child see clearly his mistakes and try to find ways to fix them together. Children need to be carefully led to the right answer, but they shouldn't voice it. Parents don't need to know the answers to all of the math problems, but they need to learn to show them exactly how to learn.

The parental method is not the only right method

Everyone learns differently, all people without exception, and children too. So forcing your child to perceive information the way a parent perceives it is, to put it mildly, wrong.

Everyone assimilates information in several ways:

• through hearing;
• Through sound and images, such as videos, movies;
• through practice;
• Through group discussion.

There are those who can assimilate information using only one of the methods presented. There are children who like a combination of several options. And there is no single correct way.

Of course, it is easier to give a child a textbook and a set of certain mathematical templates, by which you can quickly solve the simplest examples or problems. But this approach limits the children in the choice of solutions. Both parents and teachers should not only offer solutions and ways of presenting the material. It is necessary to give opportunities to combine materials or ways of solving examples, opportunities to think and think. Children should not be restricted in their approach and focus solely on memorizing the material. In mathematics, it is important not to know but to understand how processes work.